


a silhouette and nothing more

by tamquams



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Canon Compliant, Comfort, Emotions, Established Relationship, M/M, Ronan Compliant Language, dreams and grief and early morning conversations, probably takes place sometime around the opal short story, summer at the barns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:22:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25078321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tamquams/pseuds/tamquams
Summary: It wasn’t necessarilyuncommonfor Ronan to be gone in the morning, but it usually wasn’t a very good sign. Worry took hold of Adam’s heart and squeezed; he threw back the sheets and slid out of bed, moving quietly in the early morning haze.
Relationships: Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish
Comments: 16
Kudos: 139





	a silhouette and nothing more

**Author's Note:**

> this is just really short and full of strange emotions because i wrote it specifically to deal with a dream i had. sorry to bare my soul to you all at seven pm on ao3 but it had to be done.

Mornings were easily Adam’s favorite time of day, especially after moving into the Barns. He loved the soft glow of sunlight in the west-facing windows, and the way the entire house was peaceful and _quiet_ without the sounds of boots and hooves stomping all around. Most of all, he loved rolling over and throwing an arm around Ronan and pressing his face into Ronan’s neck, holding him tight and breathing him in.

Adam blinked sleepily and turned over, but his hand fell on an empty bed. Ronan wasn’t there.

It wasn’t necessarily _uncommon_ for Ronan to be gone in the morning, but it usually wasn’t a very good sign. Worry took hold of Adam’s heart and squeezed; he threw back the sheets and slid out of bed, moving quietly in the early morning haze. 

Ronan was not on the third floor of the house, nor the second; he was absent from the living room, dining room, and kitchen as well. When Adam finally eased open the front door and found Ronan sitting on the porch steps with his knees pulled to his chest, he nearly fell over with relief.

The relief was short-lasting, of course (wasn’t it always?). Ronan didn’t even have to turn around for Adam to know that something was wrong; it was evident in the curl of his shoulders, the stillness of his body. He did not look up as Adam sat down beside him, did not even acknowledge the other boy’s presence.

“How bad was it?” Adam asked after an eternity passed.

Ronan shifted slightly, tightening his grip on his own biceps. It wasn’t cold, but there was a breeze that brought with it just enough chill to set them both ashiver. That didn’t seem to be what was bothering Ronan, though.

“It wasn’t,” he sighed after a moment.

This brought Adam up short. At that point, after all that time, he had grown so used to the nightmares that he wasn’t exactly sure how to respond to anything else. What could possibly have had Ronan out of bed and on the front porch at dawn if not a night terror?

Adam tried his hand at a safe approach. “Oh?” he prompted.

Ronan sighed again, louder, and scrubbed a hand across his face. “It was good, I guess,” he said, like he couldn’t quite believe it either. He rubbed at his eyes, still looking deliberately away from Adam. “It was, um, it was my dad.”

 _Oh._ If Adam thought he hadn’t known what to say before, he certainly had no idea now. He hated himself for it, hated that he was just an ugly boy with an ugly past who specialized in dealing with ugly things. Usually, in moments like these, Adam would not bother with words at all; he would resort to touch to comfort his lover, because that was how they did things, he and Ronan. But now, with this, he was faltering. He did not reach out.

“Would you like to talk about it?” he asked instead, knowing that the answer would be _no_ before the question even left his lips.

But Ronan was nothing if not surprising, especially in that moment. “It’s just—” he began, and then he cut himself off, choking on his own words. “I don’t get to, to, to _dream_ about them. My dad, my mom, Noah, Cabeswater.” He swallowed deeply, like he was pushing his own emotions back down where they couldn’t hurt anyone. “I can have anything I want in my dreams, but I can’t have _them_.”

There was nothing for Adam to say, but the pause was not meant for Adam; it was for Ronan’s own benefit, so that he could collect his thoughts before continuing. “And then,” he sighed, voice raggedy, “and then, last night, he’s there. My dad. And I got to hug him. I got to tell him that I love him. I got to see him smile.” If Adam were to look, he was sure he would find tears in Ronan’s eyes, but he didn’t dare shift his gaze from the landscape before them. “It wasn’t _bad_. Not by a longshot. I’m not… sad. I just miss him.”

 _I’m not sad, I just miss him._ Adam didn’t understand it, but oddly enough, he sort of did. His grief was different from Ronan’s, and he had lost less people in his life, but he couldn’t say that the sentiment didn’t sink into his bones and rest there. He thought of Persephone’s voice guiding him as he scried, and Noah blowing bits of leaves off the bridge of his nose, and Cabeswater protecting him from his father. _I’m not sad, I just miss him._ Yes, strangely enough, that made perfect sense.

“Why do you think you don’t dream about them?” Adam asked softly.

Ronan shrugged then, a sign that he was coming back to himself. “I dunno. Dreams are weird like that. In the year we couldn’t come home, I didn’t even come here in my dreams. Maybe it’s guilt. Maybe it’s pain. I don’t know. I wish that I did.” His voice was slightly gruffer, more in-character. He snorted. “Hilarious how I can control everything in my dreams except for the things that I really want.”

It wasn’t hilarious at all, but he knew that. Adam worked the problem over in his head the same way that he might roll a pencil between his hands while trying to remember how to complete a question on an exam. He wondered if maybe Ronan couldn’t have the things he missed because he might try to remove them from the dream, or if maybe it was Ronan himself blocking them from entering his dreams. If he was holding it all back without even knowing it, either to protect or punish himself.

Adam did not say any of these things out loud. Instead he exhaled and wrapped an arm around Ronan, who relaxed substantially in his embrace. Somewhere nearby, a pair of wings flapped loudly, and then Chainsaw flew by above them and disappeared over the roof of the nearest barn. Adam watched with muted interest.

“I have chores to do,” Ronan mumbled eventually. He did not sound particularly enthused about the idea of leaving Adam’s arms to feed cows and collect eggs or whatever it was he did in the morning (Adam accompanied him occasionally, but more often than not Ronan let him sleep in). Adam didn’t really like the idea, either.

With a yawn, Adam pulled Ronan closer. “Don’t go just yet,” he murmured. Ronan was, as always, helpless to say no to Adam — he turned his face and burrowed into the crook of Adam’s neck, his breath warm and even on the bare skin there. Adam tilted his chin to rest the side of his face against Ronan’s buzzed scalp, the short hairs coarse against the stubble on Adam’s jawline.

“Do you think I’m fucked up?” Ronan mumbled eventually, his lips ghosting over Adam’s collarbone as he spoke.

 _No_ , Adam almost said, _I don’t._ But he took a moment to think through the wording, to put together a sentence that was both truthful and comforting, that made sense. “I don’t think you’re ‘fucked up,’” he said slowly, taking a deep breath. “I think you’ve been through a lot, and I think you’re in a lot of pain sometimes, but I wouldn’t call that ‘fucked up.’”

Ronan exhaled a puff of air through his nose. “Sometimes, I feel like I was ripped up and put back together all wrong.” His voice was low, almost afraid, like this was one of his deepest secrets and he had never voiced it before. Adam tightened his hold on Ronan incrementally. 

“Not wrong,” Adam soothed. His chest ached with the weight of Ronan’s pain, the need to carry it, any of it, all of it. “Just different.”

It still astounded Adam that he had ever thought himself incapable of love. There was nothing else this could be, the way he held Ronan and yearned to reach inside of him and scoop out everything that hurt. He had loved Ronan since long before he had even understood love. How stupid he had been, just a little under a year ago. How naïve. 

Ronan was quiet for several more minutes, and then he sighed deeply and pulled back. “Thank you,” he said, and if his eyes were watery, well, Adam would spare him the indignation and keep quiet about it. “Wanna come help me with the chores?”

Adam smiled, loose and easy. “Fine,” he said, because even if he hated cleaning barn stalls and feeding goats, he loved Ronan. “But let’s get dressed first. I don’t wanna get dirt all over my pajamas.”

Standing up and opening the screen door, Ronan just smiled back. “Fine, killjoy. Let’s go.” Adam followed him inside, and instead of being filled with worry or grief this time, they were both buoyant with love.

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you enjoyed it! as always, you're welcome to come talk to me on tumblr, i'm @wespers and i just talk about adam parrish and make gifs and sadpost at 5am. hope you're all doing well and staying safe! ♡ p.s. title is based off a lyric from these streets by bastille


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